Castles by the Sea

      Since we're a beach community, our handle on Long Beach has always been castles by the sea, President of the Board of Trustees, Roberta Fiore, said.
      Often referring to Long Beach's historical landmarks and estates as sand castles, the Society thought it would be a fun family event to spend the morning on the beach and create sand castles of their own.
      As music, donated by DJ Pat Bellantoni of Long Beach's Metro Sound, filled the early morning air, people dug holes, utilized buckets, shovels, and even spackling tools to create some very unique creations, out of the ordinary sand.
      Barbara Mosca, Vice President of the City Council was on hand to help as one of the judges. Mosca who lives in a co-op on the beach seemed happy to be there.
      Barbara has been a loyal friend to the Historical Society since the inception of our museum, Fiore said.
      The idea to host a castle making competition came to Fiore during a shopping excursion.
      The word castle' clicked with me one day while I was in Borders buying a book on castle making for my grandchild, she said. I looked at the book and thought, why aren't we doing this.
      Long Beach residents, the Stonitsch and Winter family, entered the contest building a giant castle with steps, which they made, by using a spackling tool. Searching the beach for red shells, they tried to make their creation, Castle By the Sea,' look like the houses in town, and used bits of seaweed to create area trees. When the competition was over, they won $50 for the most original sand creation.
      The cost to be involved in the sand castle competition was $20 a family, which included a complimentary, brightly colored pail, shovel, bottled water, and orange for the children. If you're young at heart, you still get a water and orange, Fiore added. The objective in having the activity was to encourage people to join the Long Beach Historical
Society and provide some fun for area residents.
      The Historical Society cares about children, Fiore said. We have a great education program through the school district in which 3rd and 4th graders from the Catholic, Hebrew Academy and Public School come to our museum on school trips.
      This year the Society has even been able to involve some of the high school students. Last November, members of the Society did some digging in the foundation block on the beach, and came up with a few interesting finds. We found pieces of tile floor, broken pottery, broken glass, and some 1906 porcelain. Fiore said. Several students from Long Beach High School who had an interest in archeology came to see it along with several invited archeologists. The Society is hoping that someone will be able to identify the items and validate a suspicion
that they have. It could be the 1880's hotel, Fiore said.
      Building sand castles is another way to involve the families of Long Beach with the Society.
      Roberta works very hard to make the kids committed to having a sense of their past and their futures, Museum Archeological Chairwoman, Liz Coffin-Allerhand, said. If they feel it's special here, it makes sense to the kids to protect Long Beach.
      Super Mario Land,' being built by the Martz family was well thought out, even having a blueprint. Nine-year-old twins, Brandon and Jessie, along with their friend Robbie Leuokove, also nine, spent the
night before mapping out their sand castle creation.
      Robbie slept over last night bringing along his pails and shovels and the kids prepared their plan on some construction paper, father Brian said. I was surprised by how interested they were.
      Lila, their seven-year-old sister, helped the boys to create the masterpiece as they all worked together using their buckets to build castles for the warring Mario and Wario. All the castles are being destroyed except for Peaches' who is being held hostage inside the big volcano by Wario, Brandon explained, pointing at different parts of his creation. There is a bridge leading to the volcano castle, but we built pits. Each guy wants the other one to fall into the pit. Loren, their Mother worked nearby as the children spoke, continuing to build the bucket shaped castles. After spending several hours, working together, the Martz's and Robbie Levokove not only received the admiration from fellow beachcombers, but also a check for $50 gleaming the prize for largest sand castle.'
      A few entries down two women, Michelle Manning, a Long Beach resident, and Kelly Donovan, her cousin, worked to dig a deep hole. The hole, over five feet deep provided much good sand for their castle, the
O'Brien Tower.'
      "I went on the Internet and researched proper sand castle building, Manning explained. You have to get below the water line to get the proper sand that will stick together.
      The website, www.sandcastlecentral.com, gave a detailed explanation on how to build a tower, a wall and contained many sand castle building pointers for the serious builder.
      Unfortunately it took a great deal of time to actually dig the hole and Manning was certain that they would not finish their creation by the 12:00 deadline. However, she was still happy to have been able to do a test run, planning on trying once again at other contests.
      This (Long Beach) is a perfect location for a big sand castle contest, she said. Kelly came down from Boston for this.
      As people stopped to enjoy the sand creations, Amanda Christianson, a Bellmore/Merrick art teacher continued her work on Undersea Design. A resident of the canal, she focused all of her attention to the many details that she and members of her family worked so hard to create. By the time they were finished, an octopus with colorful beads on its arms stared toward the afternoon sun, as a mermaid with hair made of seaweed lounged nearby. A fish with a tail detailed with small squares of colorful construction paper representing its scales, lay directly below creating an underwater motif that was dazzling. The Vaist family also helped to make Undersea Design, the
first place winner, gleaming the participants a check for $100.
      I've done this before for fun, Christianson said. But, I've never done it as a competition. Perhaps the fun that everyone experienced will encourage the families to take the time to enjoy the beauty of the beach more often. As Fiore said, it's a natural thing
to build the sand castles.